Movies like The Case of the Scorpion's Tail (1971)
The best movies like The Case of the Scorpion's Tail (1971) are Farewell, My Lovely (1975), Tightrope (1984) and Death Walks on High Heels (1971). If The Case of the Scorpion's Tail hooked you with its mystery and thriller, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedEyes Wide Shut (1999)7.5/10 from 7,471 votes
- NewestBone Lake (2025)Released 2025
- In ItalianDeath Walks on High Heels (1971)Also in Italian
Farewell, My Lovely (1975)
Private eye Philip Marlowe is hired by ex-con Moose Malloy to find his girlfriend, a former lounge dancer. While also investigating the murder of a client and the theft of a jade necklace, Marlowe becomes entangled with seductress Helen Grayle and discovers a web of dark secrets that are better left hidden.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTightrope (1984)
Wes Block is a detective who's put on the case of a serial killer whose victims are young and pretty women. The murders are getting personal when the killer chooses victims who are acquaintances of Block. Even his daughters are threatened.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDeath Walks on High Heels (1971)
Exotic dancer Nicole finds herself terrorized by a black-clad assailant determined on procuring her murdered father's stolen gems. Fleeing Paris in hopes of evading her knife-wielding pursuer, Nicole arrives in England only to discover that death stalks her at every corner.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Salton Sea (2002)
After the murder of his beloved wife, a man in search of redemption is set adrift in a world where nothing is as it seems. On his journey, he befriends slacker Jimmy "The Finn", becomes involved in rescuing his neighbor Colette from her own demons, and gets entangled in a web of deceit full of unexpected twists and turns.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBone Lake (2025)
A couple’s romantic vacation at a secluded lakeside estate is upended when they are forced to share the mansion with a mysterious and attractive couple. In this darkly hilarious and seductive horror story, a dream getaway spirals into a nightmarish maze of sex, lies, and manipulation, bringing terrifying secrets to light and triggering a bloody battle for survival.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Infernal Machine (2022)
Reclusive and controversial author Bruce Cogburn is drawn out of hiding by an obsessive fan, forcing the novelist to confront a past that he thought he could escape, and to account for events set in motion by his bestseller decades earlier. Cogburn's search for who is behind the manipulation and mental torment he encounters leads to an emotional roller-coaster ride full of fear and danger, where things are not always as clear as they seem to be, and where past deeds can have dire consequences.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBasic Instinct (1992)
Catherine, a novelist with an insatiable sexual appetite, becomes a prime suspect when her boyfriend is brutally murdered -- a crime she had described in her latest story.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEyes Wide Shut (1999)
After Dr. Bill Harford's wife, Alice, admits to having sexual fantasies about a man she met, Bill becomes obsessed with having a sexual encounter. He discovers an underground sexual group and attends one of their meetings -- and quickly discovers that he is in over his head.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & mystery
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThursday (1998)
A former Los Angeles drug dealer moves far away to Texas, making a new life for himself as a married architect in the suburbs. His old crime partner unexpectedly shows up with heroin and gangster business, attracting a slew of violent unsavory characters.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisWhat You Wish For (2024)
A talented chef with gambling woes flees to a Latin American villa to visit an old friend who appears to be living an extraordinary life as a private chef. Envy soon turns to greed and then to something deeply unsettling for the chef when he assumes his friend's life and discovers the motives of his mysterious clients.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisVice Squad (1982)
An unlikely Hollywood hooker helps a detective set a trap for a mutilator pimp.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisToo Late for Tears (1949)
Through a fluke circumstance, a ruthless woman stumbles across a suitcase filled with $60,000, and is determined to hold onto it even if it means murder.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Last Boy Scout (1991)
Somewhere in Los Angeles, the city of broken dreams, a stripper is murdered. Now, the private detective she had hired and her ex-footballer boyfriend are going to find her murderer... if they don't kill each other first. But the more they dig, the deeper they become enmeshed in a web of extortion, blackmail and corrupt politics hidden beneath the surface of professional football.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisChronicle of a Death Foretold (1987)
This suspenseful Italian crime drama is set in a Colombian river town and chronicles the series of events that led up to murder. Based on a novel by distinguished author Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the tale begins in the present as a middle-aged doctor returns to the village after a twenty-year absence to investigate the murder that occurred just before he left.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisKill the Irishman (2011)
Over the summer of 1976, thirty-six bombs detonate in the heart of Cleveland while a turf war raged between Irish mobster Danny Greene and the Italian mafia. Based on a true story, Kill the Irishman chronicles Greene's heroic rise from a tough Cleveland neighborhood to become an enforcer in the local mob.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisToo Late (2016)
Private investigator Mel Sampson is tasked with tracking down the whereabouts of a missing woman from his own past.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisNovocaine (2001)
A dentist finds himself a murder suspect after a sexy patient seduces him into prescribing her drugs.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJagged Edge (1985)
After a wealthy heiress is murdered in her beach house, her devastated husband becomes the prime suspect. He hires a lawyer who hasn’t taken a criminal case in years, and as they work together, a complicated romance develops amidst the trial.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisExit Wounds (2001)
Maverick cop Orin Boyd always brings down the domestic terrorists he tracks, but he ruffles feathers with his unorthodox techniques -- and soon finds himself reassigned to the toughest district in Detroit. When he discovers a group of detectives secretly operating a drug ring, Boyd joins forces with an unlikely ally -- gangster Latrell Walker -- to bring down the rotten cops.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisBlue Steel (1990)
Rookie cop Megan Turner orders a burglar to drop his gun. He whirls to shoot. Too late. Turner fires, killing him instantly. When someone lifts the assailant's gun from the crime scene, the police hold Turner accountable for killing an unarmed man. That same someone carves Turner's name into the bullets and uses them in a series of murders. Turner teams up with detective Nick Mann to clear her name and catch the killer. But she is drawn into a deadly game of wits with a psychopath who's always one step ahead… and much closer than she thinks!
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisDead Time (2007)
A police and a journalist uncover series of murders that lead into one problem: A treasure many parties were fighting for and caused many casualties.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Message from the King (2017)
On a relentless quest to avenge his sister's murder, a man from Cape Town infiltrates a sprawling network of lowlifes and elites in Los Angeles.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisJewels of Brandenburg (1947)
A former secret agent is sent to retrieve a priceless collection of stolen jewels from a Lisbon nightclub owner who worked both sides during World War II.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Sunset (1988)
Tom Mix and Wyatt Earp team up to solve a murder at the Academy Awards in 1929 Hollywood.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisBulldog Drummond Comes Back (1937)
Drummond's girlfriend is kidnapped by his enemies and he along with his friend Nielsen, an inspector from Scotland Yard, follow the trail and try to rescue her from the kidnappers.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Murder Over New York (1940)
When Charlie's old friend from Scotland Yard is murdered when they attend a police convention in New York, Chan picks up the case he was working on.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Shanghai (2010)
An American man returns to a corrupt, Japanese-occupied Shanghai four months before Pearl Harbor and discovers his friend has been killed. While he unravels the mysteries of the death, he falls in love and discovers a much larger secret that his own government is hiding.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller & mystery
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Poughkeepsie Tapes (2007)
When hundreds of videotapes showing torture, murder and dismemberment are found in an abandoned house, they reveal a serial killer's decade-long reign of terror and become the most disturbing collection of evidence homicide detectives have ever seen.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPossible Worlds (2000)
The same man lives out several parallel lives in different "worlds" and in different relationships at the same time.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both mystery & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMen of War (1994)
Nick Gunar is a burnt-out, jaded and hard-up former mercenary who is having a difficult time adjusting to civilian life. At the end of his rope, he is hired by the Nitro Mine Corporation to strong-arm the natives of a South China Sea island into giving up their rights to its valuable mineral resources. Nick loathes the thought of another mission, but this seemingly easy job will earn him enough money to get back with his estranged family. He recruits some of his former mercenary buddies to help him with the job. The island people refuse to give up their land and Nick decides to help them fight the greedy corporation that hired him. As greed and treachery begin to unravel, Nick's band of mercenaries choose sides.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller
SnoozefestMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Case of the Scorpion's Tail?
The closest matches to The Case of the Scorpion's Tail are Farewell, My Lovely (1975), Tightrope (1984) and Death Walks on High Heels (1971). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Case of the Scorpion's Tail?
Start with Farewell, My Lovely (1975), the closest match to The Case of the Scorpion's Tail.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Case of the Scorpion's Tail?
Eyes Wide Shut (1999), rated 7.5/10 by 7,471 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Case of the Scorpion's Tail?
Bone Lake (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there Italian movies like The Case of the Scorpion's Tail?
Yes: Death Walks on High Heels (1971) and Chronicle of a Death Foretold (1987).
How are movies similar to The Case of the Scorpion's Tail chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Case of the Scorpion's Tail, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.